Remote Sensing

It's a significant step, since the Federal Aviation Administration generally prohibits commercial use of these devices, commonly referred to as drones or UAVs. They're concerned about these inexpensive fliers getting in the way of commercial aircraft, of course, but the agency has been slow to adapt existing rules to accommodate the new technology.

In 2012, Congress ordered the FAA to develop a plan for getting drones integrated into the national airspace, but progress has not come quickly. To date, the FAA has granted exemptions to just 13 companies, many of them in the motion picture business.

"Our aim is to get beyond hobby-grade equipment and to establish what options are available and workable to produce high quality video journalism using various types of UAVs and camera setups," Vigilante said.

Look, we know all about photography here. Even in the digital age, we've got a tremendous aggregation of experts in imaging science working in this region, some of the brightest minds in the world.

But the coming boom isn't simply about capturing cool images. It's about harnessing computing power to do things with those images. And we've got the experts in that field as well.

Pictometry International, a Henrietta-based company, developed the technique of stitching together aerial photos from low-flying airplanes to create overhead images that look three-dimensional. They've also developed software and algorithms that can pinpoint locations in those photos by latitude and longitude, and even make precise measurements of things like the square footage of a building's roof.

The folks at Exelis Geospatial Systems in Gates work from even greater heights. Their researchers have designed and built the camera systems for the majority of commercial imaging satellites that have been launched, starting with the first one in 1999. Even from 373 miles in the air and traveling at 17,000 mph, they can pinpoint a spot on the ground to within a few meters.

It's this sort of technology that's really going to drive the commercial applications of drones. Software that can analyze images taken from drones to do new things, or to do old things in new ways.

Farmers could use drones to look for crop or irrigation problems, or even to keep a watch on their livestock. Utility companies could use drones to inspect pipelines or electrical wires. Imagine how a drone could change the job of a building inspector, for example, by using its camera to take measurements and identify trouble spots in areas that are difficult and dangerous for a person to go.